scribes and pharifees, to fast and pray, and to continue fervent in prayer a long time; we ought, with them, to give alms, and to give very liberally; to deny ourselves in a thousand vanities which the world doats upon, and to mortify our bodies in a decent manner: But here again lies the cafe; we ought to take care all the while, that we have no fecret hopes or defigns, either of promoting hereby our worldly profit and intereft, or of gaining the applause of our neighbours, or of making God amends for fome fins which we are loth to part with.

Our righteoufnefs ought alfo to exceed theirs in humility; not only in having a just sense of our errors and many infirmities, but also in having low and humble thoughts of our religious performances; acknowledging that it is by the grace of God we are what we are, and that by the influence of that grace, thofe performances are wrought; and confeffing from the heart, when we have done all that we are commanded to do, that we are unprofitable fervants, and have done no more than our duty.

Finally,

Finally, our righteousness ought to exceed theirs in charity, or a compaffionate temper towards all forts of diftreffed perfons. The fcribes and pharifees extended their charity to persons only of their own fect. I need not to observe, that charity confists in many other things befides giving of alms. For if almfgiving had been all the charity that was neceffary to falvation, the scribes and pharifees had been confiderable men. For they were free and liberal enough towards those of their own party. But charity is a larger and a nobler virtue. It extends its arms, not only to all forts of objects, whether friends or foes, whether relations or strangers, but (as far as its ability reacheth, and opportunity offers it self) to all forts of diftreffes. It doth not only feed and cloath, but admonish, and reprove, and inftruct, and affift, and fometimes correct and punish. It embraceth enemies. It judgeth favourably of pious heathens, much more of pious chriftians, though differing from it in opinion. It condemns none, whom God hath not condemned. It worketh no evil to its neighbour; but is ready unto every good word and work.

Thefe

These are the particulars, in which our righteousness ought to exceed the righteoufnefs of the scribes and pharifees. I come now, in the

IVth and laft place, to confider, the danger we are in if it do not; we shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.

This, one would think, fhould rouze every one of us, to take this threatening into serious confideration. If we go no farther in our righteousness than these unhappy men did, by this rule of our judge we must inevitably be miferable.

If therefore any of us have hitherto laid the stress of our devotion upon the outward performance, and have been ftrangers to the inward frame of mind, which alone is in the fight of God of great price; if we have been zealous for fmall, inconfiderable things, in matters of religion, and have neglected the more substantial and weighty part of it; if we have been felfish in our acts of piety and righteousness, and have been devout for worldly ends more than from a sense of our duty; if we have been careful to obferve fome of the command

ments

ments of the gofpel, and made no confcience of others: All this fabrick must be pulled down, and we muft begin upon a new foundation, by applying ourselves to a true gofpel life and temper.

If we are to exceed thefe men in their righteousness, we must do more than they did. We must take care to be perfect in the duties I have juft now mentioned, of fincerity, of acting for a right end, of humility, charity, and univerfal obedience. For thefe qualifications rectify what was amifs in the righteoufness of these men, and fet us in the right way, from which they erred.

Their righteoufnefs was an external, mechanical kind of righteoufnefs. It was not free, not natural. They took no care to reform their thoughts, defires, and affections. And it is to be feared, that this is the cafe of too many christians. Nay, thoufands there are, who do not come up fo much as to the negative virtues of the scribes and pharifees. They were no drunkards, no fwearers, no extortioners, no whoremongers; and yet how many, that profess themselves enlightened by the gospel VOL. III. O

of

of Christ, fall short in several of these refpects? And if even thofe, who do not exceed the righteousness of these men, shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven; what then will become of all thofe, who are not fo good as they?

Surely, it must be a deplorable condi→ tion, when men have flattered themselves all their life time, with hopes of entering. into the kingdom of heaven; to find themselves at laft fhut out? Therefore, left this should be the cafe of any of us, let us purify our hearts and minds, and take care that none of the leaven of the scribes and pharifees cleave unto us.